Asia Pacific Internet Group, the joint venture formed by e-commerce holding company Rocket Internet and telecommunications company Ooredoo, has led a €10m ($10.8m) round for domestic services provider Helpling, TechCrunch has reported.
Other existing investors in Germany-based Helpling also participated in the round, according to TechCrunch, but they did not include venture capital firm Accel, an investor in UK-based competitor Hassle, with which Helpling merged in mid-2015.
Helpling offers on-demand home services, most notably cleaning, though it is expanding to partner with local businesses in order to add services such as painting or window cleaning. It was incubated by Rocket Internet in early 2014.
The company raised $17m in late 2014 from Mangrove Capital, Phenomen Ventures, Point Nine Capital and angel investor Lukas Gadowski before securing $47m in an early 2015 series B round backed by Rocket Internet, Lakestar, Kite Ventures and Gadowski.
However, the latest round was closed at a lower valuation than the series B round, undisclosed sources told TechCrunch, though Helpling co-founder Benedikt Franke told the publication that the company aims to reach profitability in the next year.
“The question of funding for us is only a matter of how much money do we need, or how much money should we take on,” he said. “Our core markets already became profitable during the summer, so we do not need more money to make our core business profitable. We raised a lot of money in the past to be in that position.”